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An undersea fiberoptic cable located between mainland Norway and the Svalbard archipelago in the Arctic Ocean has been put out of action in a still-mysterious incident. The outage on the subsea communications cable — the furthest north of its kind anywhere in the world — follows an incident last year in which different cables linking an undersea surveillance network off the Norwegian coast were severed, a story that we covered in detail at the time. The latest disruption involves one of two fiberoptic cables that enable communications between the Norwegian mainland and Norwegian-administered Svalbard that lies between the mainland and...

Arctic Sea Ice for 1-1-2022 is the highest since 2004.

(CNN)The Arctic Ocean has been warming since the onset of the 20th century, decades earlier than instrument observations would suggest, according to new research. The study, published Wednesday in the journal Science Advances, found that the expansion of warm Atlantic Ocean water flowing into the Arctic, a phenomenon known as "Atlantification," has caused Arctic water temperature in the region studied to increase by around 2 degrees Celsius since 1900. Francesco Muschitiello, an author on the study and assistant professor of geography at the University of Cambridge, said the findings were worrisome because the early warming suggests there might be a...

The scariest scenario of the global warming doomsayers has been the idea that the melting Arctic ice cap would put coastal cities underwater. For example:‘Scientists in the US have presented one of the most dramatic forecasts yet for the disappearance of Arctic sea ice,’ reported the BBC back in 2007. ‘Their latest modelling indicates that northern polar waters could be ice-free in summers within just 5-6 years.’Professor Wieslaw Maslowski from the Department of Oceanography of the US Navy predicted an ice-free Arctic Ocean by the summer of 2013.Maslowski added that his prediction was on the conservative side, too: “Our projection...

Less than 10 years remain before the oft-claimed "tipping point" for the planet, but sea ice in the Arctic Ocean is the highest it's been in nine years, increasing more than 30% from last year, while the Antarctic's level is well above normal. That's according to the Ocean and Sea Ice Satellite Application Facility's High Latitude Processing Center, pointed out climate-change skeptic Tony Heller. https://realclimatescience.com/2021/08/20-increase-in-arctic-sea-ice-volume/

Imagine not a white, but a green Arctic, with woody shrubs as far north as the Canadian coast of the Arctic Ocean. This is what the northernmost region of North America looked like about 125,000 years ago, during the last interglacial period, finds new research from CU Boulder.

An international group of researchers report the discovery of numerous new species of Chlamydiae growing in deep Arctic Ocean sediments, in absence of any obvious host organisms. The researchers had been exploring microbes that live over 3 km below the ocean surface and several meters into the ocean seafloor sediment during an expedition to Loki's Castle, a deep-sea hydrothermal vent field located in the Arctic Ocean in-between Iceland, Norway, and Svalbard. This environment is devoid of oxygen and macroscopic life forms. Unexpectedly, the research team came across highly abundant and diverse relatives of Chlamydia. "Finding Chlamydiae in this environment was...

In the depths of winter, water temperatures in the ice-covered Arctic Ocean can sink below zero. That’s cold enough to freeze many fish, but the conditions don’t trouble the cod. A protein in its blood and tissues binds to tiny ice crystals and stops them from growing.

Ice is melting in unprecedented ways as summer approaches in the Arctic. In recent days, observations have revealed a record-challenging melt event over the Greenland ice sheet, while the extent of ice over the Arctic Ocean has never been this low in mid-June during the age of weather satellites. Greenland saw temperatures soar up to 40 degrees above normal Wednesday, while open water exists in places north of Alaska where it seldom, if ever, has in recent times. It’s “another series of extreme events consistent with the long-term trend of a warming, changing Arctic,” said Zachary Labe, a climate researcher...

Over the weekend, the climate system sounded simultaneous alarms. Near the entrance to the Arctic Ocean in northwest Russia, the temperature surged to 84 degrees Fahrenheit (29 Celsius). Meanwhile, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere eclipsed 415 parts per million for the first time in human history. By themselves, these are just data points. But taken together with so many indicators of an altered atmosphere and rising temperatures, they blend into the unmistakable portrait of human-induced climate change. Saturday’s steamy 84-degree reading was posted in Arkhangelsk, Russia, where the average high temperature is around 54 this time of...

ROVANIEMI, Finland (AP) - The Trump administration warned China and Russia on Monday that the U.S. won't stand for aggressive moves in the Arctic region, which is rapidly opening up to development and commerce as temperatures warm and sea ice melts. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a speech in Finland that the U.S. will compete for influence in the Arctic and counter attempts to make it the strategic preserve of any one or two nations. He said the rule of law must prevail for the Arctic to remain peaceful, and he criticized China and Russia for what...

The Trump administration said Thursday it is taking steps to expand oil drilling in the Arctic and Atlantic oceans as President Donald Trump continues to push for U.S. “energy dominance” in the global market. The Interior Department is rewriting a five-year drilling plan established by the Obama administration, with an eye toward opening areas in the Arctic and Atlantic oceans that now are off-limits to drilling. It’s one of six initiatives that the president unveiled Thursday in hopes of generating more energy exports and jobs. “The golden era of American energy is now underway,” Trump said in a Thursday speech...

Drill, baby, drill! It seems like months ago now - wait, it was months ago - that the one-foot-out-the-door Barack Obama was pushing through as many executive orders as he could in an attempt to lock in liberal policies after he left office. One of the worst, which we reported at the time, put severe limits on offshore drilling in the Atlantic and Arctic oceans - and there was some question as to whether President Trump would have the authority to reverse the orders once he took office. I suppose nothing is ever truly over until left-wing federal judges weigh...

In his enviro-extremism, President Obama is attempting to tie President-elect Trump’s hands by blocking vast swaths of the Arctic Ocean and stretches of the Atlantic from oil and natural-gas drilling. The gambit, announced by the administration on Tuesday, is part of an eleventh-hour wave by which Obama is flooding the regulatory zone: Promulgating so many rules – of the unpopular, hard-left variety that Democrats dare not unveil before Election Days – that he hopes the Trump administration will find it too cumbersome to undo all of them. The incoming president should not let his predecessor get away with it. Obama’s...

For months, Scandinavian countries have accused Russian military planes and ships of slipping into their waters without permission. It’s made many Nordic governments wary of the Kremlin’s intentions in the Baltic Sea and the Arctic Ocean. Russia’s assertive behavior is driving Sweden and Finland — two countries that have never been part of NATO — closer to the alliance. At present, Norway, Denmark and Iceland make up NATO’s Nordic members. According to Anna Wieslander at the Atlantic Council: Denmark has played a key role, with some support from the United Kingdom, putting Baltic Sea security and the perspective of relevant...

Russia's Foreign Ministry confirmed Tuesday that it had submitted a bid for vast Arctic territories that could contain large quantities of oil and gas to the United Nations. The ministry said in a statement that Moscow was claiming over 463,000 square miles of Artic sea shelf extending more than 350 nautical miles from the shore. The Arctic is believed to hold up to 25 percent of the planet's untapped oil and gas supplies, and Russia, the U.S., Canada, Denmark and Norway have all been trying to assert jurisdiction over parts of the territory. The competition has intensified in recent years...

The Obama administration gave conditional approval on Monday for Shell Gulf of Mexico, Inc. to start drilling for oil and gas in the Arctic Ocean this summer. The approval is a major victory for Shell and the rest of the petroleum industry, which has sought for years to drill in the remote waters of the Chukchi seas, which are believed to hold vast reserves of oil and gas. “We have taken a thoughtful approach to carefully considering potential exploration in the Chukchi Sea, recognizing the significant environmental, social and ecological resources in the region and establishing high standards for the...

Changes in the Arctic Ocean are so profound that the region is entering what amounts to "a new era", according to Norwegian scientists. A switch from a permanent cover of thick ice will have far-reaching implications, they say. The Norwegian Polar Institute has been mounting an expedition to the Arctic Ocean during the year's coldest months. The director of the institute, Jan-Gunnar Wanker, said that measuring what happens in the winter was vital to improving scenarios for future climate change. "A new era has entered, we are going from old ice to young ice, thinner ice and the climate models...

In May 1881 US explorers approached Jeannette Island, Wrangell Island and Henrietta Island in the Arctic Ocean and claimed them for the United States. But according to the Obama Department of State no claim exists today over these US islands. In fact the State Department is conspiring with Russian President Putin to give away Wrangell Island to Russians. Wrangell and its 200 mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ) has billions of barrels of oil/gas reserves and hundreds of millions of pounds of fisheries. It also has a strategic military location for tracking Russian moves in Arctic. The Coast Guard is a...

Research by the University of Birmingham has provided evidence that a warm atmosphere rich in carbon dioxide was present in an ancient ice age. This could only have happened if the planet was nearly all covered in ice and snow. Scientists from the University’s School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, say that, whereas today, we associate more greenhouse gases with a warm world, in a very severe ice age, even plenty of greenhouse gas cannot stop the world being covered in reflective ice and snow. This type of glaciation could occur again in the future if the Earth’s atmosphere...